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Andrei Gromyko, Soviet statesman, Foreign Minister of the Soviet Union was born

18 July 1909

“All the foreign policy had been in fact under his personal impact, under the sign of his personality… He kept very strongly to the established position. The least of all he preferred to “pass to an alternative position””.

V. Suhodrev, interpreter and diplomat

On July 5 (18), 1909 in the village of Starye Gromyki, Gomel district, Mogilev province in a family of peasant was born Andrei Andreevich Gromyko, future Soviet statesman, diplomat, Minister of Foreign Affairs of the Soviet Union, President of the Supreme Soviet Presidium of USSR.

Having graduated from a vocational school in Gomel and Agriculture technical secondary school in Staroborisovsk, Gromyko entered the Minsk Economy Institute.

In his second year in the Institute Andrei Andreevich started to work, first as a teacher, then as the director of a rural school near Minsk. Not long before graduation from the Institute, Gromyko was summoned to Minsk and offered a postgraduate course which prepared general economists. In the end of 1934 he was transferred from the postgraduate course in Minsk to Moscow.

In 1936 Gromyko defended Candidate’s dissertation on the USA agriculture and was sent to work at the Economy Institute under the Academy of Science of USSR as a senior scientist. Taking his postgraduate course and while working on the dissertation, Gromyko had been seriously studying English language.

In 1939 Andrei Gromyko was appointed the Head of the USA Department in the People’s Commissariat of Foreign Affairs and the same year was transferred to work in the USSR embassy in Washington. In 1943 at the age of 34 Andrei Andreevich became Russian ambassador in the USA and took part in preparation and carrying out of Yalta, Potsdam, Dumbarton Oaks, San-Francisco conferences.

In 1946 Gromyko became the first Soviet representative in the OUN Security Council. He had occupied the post until 1948, fulfilling at the same time the duties of the Minister of Foreign Affairs Deputy.

In 1949 Gromyko was appointed the First Deputy of the Minister of Foreign Affairs of the Soviet Union. From 1952 to 1953 he had worked the ambassador of USSR in London.

Andrei Andreevich Gromyko took the post of the Minister of Foreign Affairs of USSR in February of 1957. At the time the world was on the edge of a military conflict.

Led by Gromyko, who stood up for peaceful relationship with the USA and other Western countries, the Russian diplomacy had scored significant success. On August 5, 1963 was signed the Agreement on prohibition of nuclear weapon test in atmosphere, space and under water. On July 1, 1968 was concluded the Agreement on non-proliferation of nuclear weapons. In August of 1975 in Helsinki was signed the Final act of the Conference for Security and Co-operation in Europe which had not just European but the global impact.

While working as a diplomat in USA and England, Gromyko had been occupied with scientific activity. For his work “Export of American capital. On the history of USA capital export as a means of economical and political expansion” he was conferred with a degree of Doctor of Economics. In 1981 was published the “Expansion of dollar” and in 1983 – monograph “External expansion of the capital: history and modern times” which was a resume of the long years of research of scientist and diplomat on one of the most urgent issues of political economy. For his scientific research Andrei Gromyko was given the USSR State Prize twice.

In 1973 Andrei Gromyko became a member of the Political Bureau of the Soviet Union Communist Party Central Committee; in 1983 – the first Deputy of the Chairman of the Government of the USSR.

In 1985 Andrei Gromyko left the post of the Minister of Foreign Affairs and until October 1988 had worked as Chairman of the USSR Supreme Soviet Presidium.

In October of 1988 Andrei Andreevich retired on a pension and worked on his memoirs.